LES DENNISLes Dennis (born Leslie Dennis Heseltine; on 12 October 1953) is an English comedian, television presenter and actor. He was best known as the host of 'Family Fortunes' for 15 years.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Dennis

SHAUN WILLIAMSONShaun Williamson (born 4 November 1965) is an English actor, singer, media personality and occasional presenter, best known for his former role as Barry Evans in soap opera 'EastEnders' and as a version of himself in BBC sitcom 'Extras'.

KEITH CHEGWINKeith Chegwin (born 17 January 1957) is an English television presenter and actor. In the mid 1970s, he moved away from acting and became a household name presenting programmes such as 'Multi-Coloured Swap Shop', 'Cheggers Plays Pop' and, in the 80s, 'Saturday Superstore'.

Friday, July 12, 2013

Dana DeLoach is a fellow follower of the Facebook page for 'The Twilight Zone'. And during the annual T-Zone marathon on the Fourth of July, she submitted for approval this example of fanfic:

The town isn't so quiet now, but there are a lot more people stopping over. The girl is all grown up (aliens age more slowly) and has expanded her play area, which is now filled with much more than stage bread, stuffed squirrels and papier-mâché lawns! And the train actually makes stops all over town. Willoughby it's not, but it's not a bad place to live, after all. Bob and Millie have been co-mayors who run the town for many, many years (they're still young - humans age more slowly there), and they're very well adjusted and happy residents——but Bob still gets a headache whenever that alien girl laughs.Dana DeLoach

The giant people show up all the time in TV commercials, usually in commercials for beer or airlines. But they don't make themselves at home; otherwise we'd be hearing about them in other TV shows.... Wouldn't we?

These blipverts are a link to the TV adaptation of Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels", and the giants are from the land of Brobdingnag. Lemuel Gulliver thought they were from another land to be found on Earth, like many of the other places he visited - like Lilliput (seen in a TV commercial last year) and the Island of the Houyhnhnms (birthplace of Mr. Ed).

But Brobdingnag is in another dimension which is accessible at certain vortex points around the world. We've come to know it from 'Land Of The Giants' and in the 'Twilight Zone' episodes "The Invaders" and "The Little People". (The giant spacemen at the end were explorers from Brobdingnag.)

The characters from the 'Twilight Zone' episode "Stopover In A Quiet Town" were abducted by a Brobdignagian family to become pets for their "little" girl. And thanks to Dana DeLoach, we can surmise what happened to her......

From Wikipedia:Robert Hepler "Rob" Lowe (born March 17, 1964) is an American film and television actor. He garnered fame after appearing in such films as "The Outsiders", "Oxford Blues", "About Last Night...", "St. Elmo's Fire", "Wayne's World", "Tommy Boy", and "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me". On television, he played Sam Seaborn on 'The West Wing' and Senator Robert McCallister on 'Brothers & Sisters'. He is currently appearing on 'Parks and Recreation' as Chris Traeger.

AS SEEN IN:

'Naked Truth'

"The Bubble Show"

SYNOPSIS:

Lowe was in the hospital to have blood work done, but he was stuck with a nurse who thought she had seen him in "Legends Of The Fall" (Brad Pitt), "Interview With A Vampire" (Brad Pitt), or "Pocahontas" (a cartoon!)

O'BSERVATIONS:

This is today's tie-in to the "Captain Johnny" episode of 'Franklin & Bash'. For this season, there has been a running sub-plot about the new home for Peter and Jared right on the beach - with their neighbor being the so-far unseen Rob Lowe.

In the "Captain Johnny" episode, the lawyers found Lowe's pristine couch drying outside and they claimed ownership based on "curbside law". They were cheered on by their boss and landlord Stanton Infeld, who has had a long-running feud with the actor.

Apparently, Rob Lowe will be appearing in the season finale in August, so we'll probably be showcasing him again this year. In the meantime, a valid connection between 'Franklin & Bash' and 'The Naked Truth' can be argued, even if he hasn't shown up yet on the former.

It was pure serendipiteevee that I got these pics! After deciding I wanted to dedicate one post per day to the "Captain Johnny" episode, I wondered if there were any other TV shows in which Rob Lowe appeared as himself. Not only did I learn about this 'Naked Truth' episode, but I discovered that the TV Guide channel was going to show it this past Tuesday!

I apologize for the quality of the pictures. Once again they were taken off my old-fashioned TV using my Blackberry Playbook.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

TNT missed a great chance to have an in-joke crossover between two of their shows this week, and they wouldn't have needed to tangle with the logistics of competing producers or the cost of hiring the actors. All it needed was a slight rewrite of the script - no more than a name change!

On 'Major Crimes', Los Angeles Police Captain Raydor wanted to send Lt. Provenza to Boston in order to learn more about their best supsect... who was officially listed as dead. But her immediate boss, Commander Taylor, couldn't justify the cost. He suggested that the team contact an Inspector Kepler in Boston and have him send them the full jacket on their suspect.

All Taylor needed to do was suggest that they contact Lt. Sean Cavanaugh and we would have had a legitimate link to 'Rizzoli & Isles'! And that could have led to Lt. Cavanaugh (played by Brian Goodman) becoming the next John Munch: a regular on 'Rizzolit & Isles' but mentioned or guest-starring on the other TNT shows like 'Major Crimes', 'Perception', 'King & Maxwell', and 'Franklin & Bash'.

What are you, like... secret royalty?Rachel King: Yeah, I'm Princess Khaleesi from the House Targaryon.

By now I'm sure all of Team Toobworld recognizes that as a reference to George R.R. Martin's book cycle "A Song Of Ice And Fire", which has been adapted into an HBO series called "Game Of Thrones".

But because there was nothing to cause a Zonk regarding the TV series, we automatically defer it to be a reference to the books. (The events of those books happened in Earth Prime-Time's universe, on the twin planet Mondas. Martin somehow got hold of the history of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros and wrote it up as fantasy. How he did so is still up for a good splainin, but I gave it a shot already.)

So for Rachel to invoke the title held by Danaerys, she must have read the books. However, I don't think they made too strong an impression on her - it sounded as though she was using the title of "Khaleesi" as a personal name. She should have said "Khaleesi Danaerys of the House Targaryon" instead.

But I forgive her. (Ain't I noble?) Not everybody can be the O'Bsessive nerd that I am.

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

John Ratzenberger guest-starred in this episode as the judge presiding over Peter and Jared's maritime piracy case which saw his bench splattered with projectile vomit.

The judge's name was Elliot Reid, which is almost the same name as an actor who only passed away a few weeks before the episode aired. (He spelled his name as "Elliott".)

Elliott Reid was mostly a character actor in quite a few TV shows, but who is best known for his major role in the movie "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes". He was 93 years old.

However, with the judge's name spelled with only one "t", it's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that we might make a theory of relateeveety for his character based on his name.

It could be that Judge Reid has a niece, perhaps a grand niece, who was named after him. This Elliot Reid grew up to become an endocrinologist at the New Sacred Heart Hospital, after interning at the original Sacred Heart Hospital.

This could mean a theoretical link between 'Franklin & Bash' and 'Scrubs'. And considering 'Scrubs' is no longer being produced and Ratzenberger's character was only a guest star, it could be a theory that holds up.

Peter Michael Bergman (born June 11, 1953) is an American soap opera actor best known for his portrayals as Dr. Cliff Warner on 'All My Children' (1979-1989) as well as Jack Abbott on 'The Young and the Restless' (since 1989).

In 1997, Bergman portrayed Jack Abbott in an episode "The Heather Biblow story" on 'The Nanny', where he shared an on-screen kiss with fellow guest-star, Pamela Anderson.

Bergman says that his success is a "series of accidents" because he didn't have huge aspirations, he just wanted to be a working actor.

SYNOPSIS:

The woman who stole Fran's job and fiance now has a job on "The Young and the Restless." Fran steals that job from her and she takes Fran's nanny job instead. (IMDb)

O'BSERVATION:

What a surprise! Wikipedia got something wrong - Bergman played himself playing Jack Abbott in that episode of 'The Nanny'.

Yes, this is a Zonk. Apparently the events that transpire in Genoa City are deemed worthy of their own TV show. And luckily, Bergman looks exactly like Abbott. What happens during the Toobworld version of 'The Young & The Restless' are probably fictionalized versions of what happens in the version we see in the Trueniverse.

Today's League of Themselves entry is presented in memory of my late mother, who was a big fan of his on 'The Young & The Restless'. I was so happy I was able to get her an autographed picture of him, thanks to my friend Mary Brooks (who was working with him at the time in connection to the play "Perfect Crime".)

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Conan Christopher O'Brien (born April 18, 1963) is an American television host, comedian, writer, producer, and voice actor. He is best known for hosting several late-night talk shows, the most recent of which, 'Conan', premiered on American cable television station TBS in 2010. O'Brien was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, and was raised in an Irish Catholic family. He served as president of the Harvard Lampoon while attending Harvard University, and was a writer for the sketch comedy series 'Not Necessarily the News'.

After writing for several comedy shows in Los Angeles, he joined the writing staff of 'Saturday Night Live'. O'Brien was a writer and producer for 'The Simpsons' for two seasons until he was commissioned by NBC to take over David Letterman's position as host of 'Late Night' in 1993.

A virtual unknown to the public, O'Brien's 'Late Night' tenure received unfavorable reviews and remained on a multi-week renewal cycle during its early years. The show generally improved over time and was highly regarded by the time of his departure in 2009. Afterwards, O'Brien relocated from New York to Los Angeles to host his own incarnation of 'The Tonight Show' for seven months until network politics prompted a host change in 2010.

AS SEEN IN:

'30 Rock'

"Tracy Does Conan"

SYNOPSIS:On the TV show '30 Rock', O'Brien is depicted as an ex-boyfriend of lead character Liz Lemon, who works in the same building. In the episode "Tracy Does Conan," Conan appears as himself, awkwardly reunited with Lemon and coerced by network executive Jack Donaghy into having the character Tracy Jordan on 'Late Night', despite having been assaulted in Jordan's previous appearance. (Wikipedia)

AS SEEN IN:

'Arrested Development'

"The B. Team"

SYNOPSIS:

When Michael Bluth tried to make a movie about his family,Michael offered the role of George Bluth to Andy Richter, who joined when Conan O'Brien insulted him once too often.

BCnU!

* Since I am a "character" in the TV Universe (thanks to 'The Hap Richards Show', 'Ranger Andy', "The Deadliest Season", and 'The Late Show with David Letterman', our televersions could very well be related Over There......

Comic book characters have counterparts in the other fictional universes spawned from the imagination of Mankind. Mostly we've seen them in the Cineverse and as for the TV Land-scape, they're mostly in the Tooniverse. But they've also appeared in BookWorld and in the universe based on songs.

As for Earth Prime-Time, several super-heroes from comic books have appeared over the decades. Batman and Robin in the Sixties, Spiderman and Wonder Woman in the Seventies, with the Hulk bridging the Seventies into the Eighties, and then the Flash in the Nineties.

As for the new millennium? I guess the half-vampire Blade qualifies.....

And of course there's Superman, who protected Earth Prime-Time in the 1950s before dying in the early 1960s. (All of the other incarnations of the Man of Steel in the TV Universe are to be found in alternate dimensions.)

It's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that their colleagues from the Comic Book World exist in the main Toobworld as well. We just haven't met them yet.

One example is Wolverine of "The X-Men". We've seen him in the Cineverse, with a new movie opening soon. And he's made his mark as an animated character in the Tooniverse. But in Toobworld?

I think he does exist, and one day - once the film franchise furor fades - he could be adapted for life during Prime-Time.

In the meantime, other TV characters talked about him as though he did exist along with them in the TV Universe.

JARED:

Going out there to face the elements,

Doing it the way he wants,

You know who he reminds me of?

PETER:

Wolverine.

JARED:

I was going to say us, but Wolverine too....

There's no mention of the comic books, nor the movies, not even the cartoons. So the standard rule is to accept the reference as being about a "real-life" character.

So for now, as far as 'Franklin & Bash' are concerned, Wolverine is the real deal.

The same can't be said for his fellow mutant in the X-Men, Jean Grey, however......

JARED:

Hottest psychic character?

PETER:

Jean Grey, the red-head from "X-Men".

JARED:

"Carrie."

PETER:

That's telekinesis. She can move things.

JARED:

Yes, she could....

So for Peter, Jean Grey is either a comic book character, a movie character, or a cartoon super-hero. Perhaps all three. But Jared's reference to "characters", doesn't bode well for Jean Grey to be living in the same TV dimension the two lawyers live in.

As for Jared's reference to Carrie, it's a combination of BookWorld and the Cineverse......

Monday, July 8, 2013

In the 'Franklin & Bash' episode "Captain Johnny", the lawyers entered into evidence a copy of TV Guide from December of 1958. They hoped that a 'Perry Mason' episode entitled "The Case Of The Perjured Parrot" would serve as precedent for them to call a parrot to testify in court.

There really was such an episode of 'Perry Mason' back then. Here is the synopsis from the IMDb:

The only witness to a rich man's murder is his parrot, who keeps repeating the suspect's name. But in court, everyone is surprised at what the bird says next.

What we saw on our TV screens was "real life" being played out in Toobworld. What was offered to the TV audience within Earth Prime-Time would have looked quite different since the actors hired would not necessarily look like the people involved. (Raymond Burr of course would be the exception since he had to be cited at some point in some TV show as starring in the series.) Scripts and direction would have been altered as well.

One other point about that issue of TV Guide - Judge Elliott Reid flipped through the copy and exclaimed:

"Oh look! Buddy Hackett is on Johnny Carson tonight!"

This was O'Bviously just a joke on His Honor's part - Johnny Carson didn't become the host of the 'Tonight' show until October, 1962.

Judith Sheindlin, better known as Judge Judy (born October 21, 1942), is an American lawyer, judge,television personality, and author. Since 1996, Sheindlin has presided over her own successful Daytime Emmy Award winning reality courtroom series named after her, 'Judge Judy'.

Sheindlin passed the New York bar examination in 1965, and became a prosecutor in the family court system. In 1982 Mayor Ed Koch appointed her as a judge, first in criminal court, then later as Manhattan's supervising family court judge in 1986.

It was reported in mid-2012 that Sheindlin is the highest paid television personality, making $123,000 per episode of 'Judge Judy', which amounts to $45 million annually for the 52 days she tapes her show a year.

I would have added the two "Addams Family" movies to the list of good remakes, as well as "Maverick" to make it a Super Six list. For the worst? "Sgt. Bilko", "McHale's Navy", and "Mission Impossible" round out the Super Six list of the truly awful offal....

So by hiring Maurice Gosfield as the guest star in this episode, the creators of this show wanted their cake without having to pay for it. They dressed him like Duane Doberman, had him act like Duane Doberman, and they even made a reference to the old 'Bilko' show when he told Mike O'Toole that he reminded him of his old sergeant.

I guess it was the eyeglasses and Mike's barking of the marching orders......

But I guess they didn't want to pay Nat Hiken for the use of the character of Duane Doberman, so they created a similar soldier by the suggestive name of Dilly Dillingham.

Trying to work up a splainin in which he really is Private Doberman with an alias (or vice versa for Dillingham) would violate the tenet of Occam's Razor. Doberman/Dillingham isn't really that smart to pull off such a stunt and government records would have put the lie to such a ploy.

But they could be "Identical Cousins". As established in 'The Patty Duke Show', Identical Cousins Patty and Cathy Lane were the off-spring of twin brothers Martin and Kenneth Lane. But "Identical Cousins" for Toobworld has become a euphemism for two characters who look exactly alike because one of their parents from both families cheated on their marriage vows in true soap opera style.

So either Duane's father and Dilly's mother or vice versa carried on an affair that led to the birth of an identical half brother to the other.

Doberman and Dilly's paths may have crossed at some point during their Army careers. Dilly may even have served under Bilko at some point, which is why he thought of the motor pool sergeant during this episode. It's just something that falls under the Chekov-Khan Encounter rule - it happened; we just didn't get the chance to see it on our TV screens.

I'm hoping this is something I can do every week, presenting a classic TV episode and then mining it for its Toobworld gold. I just have to find episodes that spark the Toobworld thought process......

I don't know how I missed seeing that blipvert last year. (This video was posted on YouTube in 2012.) But I've seen it now, thanks to heavy airplay in 'Warehouse 13' and other genre shows, and now it's wiggled its way into my brain.

The song comes from the movie "National Lampoon's Vacation", as heard in full during this very entertaining opening sequence for the credits:

But Lindsay Buckingham, who wrote and sang "Holiday Road", decided to go with a different theme for his music video:

I'm assuming the looming approach of the year 1984 put a lot of people into a George Orwell frame of mind. Which makes me think that perhaps this music video shares the Borderlands with the movie "Brazil". And with Buckingham's vision of that dystopian future, he and his co-workers may have been visited by Mr. Sweet the musical demon......

(Until I went looking for the video, my brain had assumed "Holiday Road" was written by, if not also performed by, Kenny Loggins. Based on the comments in one of these videos, it looks like I'm not the only one. I guess there's something about it that is reminiscent of Loggins' theme song for "Caddyshack".)

At any rate, "Holiday Road" is an infectious song and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who has found themselves "O'Bsessed" with it.....

By the way, my whole point in writing this post was the hope that I could inflict the song into your brains and release me from its unrelenting presence in my noggin....

Bullock confronted movie producer Peter Dragon after she discovered that he was peddling a sex tape made during the time that they were dating.

From Wikipedia:

Sandra Annette Bullock (born July 26, 1964) is an American actress and producer. Bullock rose to fame in the 1990s after roles in successful films such as "Demolition Man" (1993), "Speed" (1994), "The Net" (1995), "While You Were Sleeping" (1995), "A Time to Kill" (1996), and "Hope Floats" (1998). In the new millennium, she appeared in such films as "Miss Congeniality" (2000), "The Lake House" (2006), and "Crash" (2004), the third of which received critical acclaim. In 2007, she was ranked as the 14th richest woman in the entertainment industry with an estimated fortune of US$85 million.

In 2009, Bullock starred in two of the more financially successful films of her career, "The Proposal" and "The Blind Side". Bullock was awarded a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress, a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, and the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as Leigh Anne Tuohy in "The Blind Side". She is listed in the 2012 edition of the Guinness Book Of World Records as the highest-paid actress, with $56 million.

Just An Old Cowhand On The TiVo Grande

As the Trickster once said, "Reality is boring, that's why I change it whenever I can."
I'm just "The Man Who Viewed Too Much", and "Inner Toob" is a blog exploring and celebrating the 'reality' of an alternate universe in which everything that ever happened on TV actually takes place.
Most of my theories about the TV Universe come from thinking inside the box and thus can't be proven. But I've never been one to shy away from a tall tale.....
Remember: "The more you watch, the more you've seen!"